


Only For You

by bukkunkun



Series: The Desecration of A National Novel [1]
Category: Noli Me Tangere & Related Works - José Rizal
Genre: 4 years in the making god bless, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Steampunk, Blood and Gore, Cannibalism, M/M, au where elias is apparently an aswang, kinda since he's a monster anyway????? oh wth, the desecration of a national novel, this is a direct reference to the comic tabi po pls read it it's amazing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-20
Updated: 2014-06-20
Packaged: 2018-02-05 10:43:58
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,068
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1815694
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bukkunkun/pseuds/bukkunkun
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“I know you will find a way.”</p><p>“I always do.” Elias replied. “I just highly doubt you would approve of it.”</p>
            </blockquote>





	Only For You

**Author's Note:**

> An AU inspired by the comic [Tabi Po](www.tabi-po.com) by Mervin Malonzo. I absolutely fell in love with the story and his concept of aswang and I love blood and gore so here we are with a slashfic AU that was hastily written in UPD DNA Barcoding Lab in 1-2 hours tops. The steampunk side is because of a reason stated below.
> 
> THIS IS ALL BECAUSE OF [JAPH](japhers.tumblr.com) AND HIS STUPIDLY HOT CHARACTER DESIGNS ON FACEBOOK AND TUMBLR AND I AM GONNA CRY
> 
> I MADE A PROMISE MONTHS AGO I WILL NOW DELIVER WITH ALL THE SHAME
> 
> HAPPY (BELATED) BIRTH ANNIVERSARY TO DR. JOSE P RIZAL I AM SO SO SO SO SORRY

“You’ve taken a fondness to boating.” The young woman commented as the wood beneath them creaked softly, the water around them parting gently with soft swishes and smooth waves as the trees lazily rolled by, green and brown and yellow all around them in the wind-rustling alcove of trees and grass and flowers and budding fruit, as he sighed and laid back in the cushions of the seat across her.

“You tend to fall in love with the greenery.” He replied, idly dipping his white-gloved fingers into the clear water as far ahead of them, the boatman steered them gently towards the middle of the river for a smoother ride. “What with all the growing factories and steam pipes in the city.” He cast a glance at the distance, past the trees and crops and fields and at the dark smoke and steam and metal-pipe skyline of the city far away from them and so did his companion.

“The Revolution, that’s what they called it, didn’t they?” she asked, leaning slightly forward to smoothen down her skirt. “Was it like this in Spain?”

“All over Europe.” He replied, turning his attention back to her. “I almost forgot how much I loved the colour green until I came back home.”

She smiled at him. “Crisostomo. Is this place really home, to you?”

“Of course, where else would be home?” he asked, chuckling, but his smile faded when he saw her smile had morphed into a frown. “Maria?”

“So much has changed since you left, my dear friend.” She murmured, closing her eyes, before shaking her head. “But you look contented enough.” She sighed. “I am glad things haven’t gotten to you that terribly.”

Crisostomo frowned at that. He knew what she meant—his father’s death was just the beginning of all change in the home he held dear, once familiar and kind like an old friend, now familiar and terrible like a forgotten one.

“We’re nearing the port,” the boatman spoke up, and Maria’s beautiful eyes widened.

“Ah, yes, thank you,” she smiled up at him, before turning to Crisostomo. “I have to go to a friend’s when we arrive at port. I shall see you at my father’s home later this evening?”

He nodded at her courteously. “If that is what you wish.”

Maria giggled and gave him a tiny wave as the boat came to a smooth stop at the small boardwalk. Crisostomo made a move to stand up, but the boatman took Maria’s hand and helped her onto the boardwalk, the young woman smiling at him kindly with an amused chuckle at Crisostomo as he petulantly scowled at the boatman who was handing her the parasol she brought with her.

“Perhaps another time, Crisostomo.” she teased, chuckling behind her fan, and the boatman grinned.

“Well, it seems I have to work a little harder to get ahead of him.” He said, and Maria giggled brightly.

“Oh, you.” She sighed and Crisostomo rolled his eyes as he got to his feet anyway. “I’ll see you later this evening.”

“Of course.” Crisostomo nodded, and she waved the two of them goodbye as she opened up her parasol and strolled away towards a carriage that was waiting for her as Crisostomo once again took his seat. The two men waited for her to leave, before the boatman kicked off the boardwalk and ushered the boat down the calm river once more, more slowly than before, as he set down the oar and sat down in Maria’s place across the still-frowning young man.

“Are you mad?” the boatman smirked.

“’ _I have to work a little harder to get ahead of him_ ’? Really?” Crisostomo snapped at him. “She is my childhood sweetheart, have a little shame, Elias.”

“You _are_ cheating on her with me, you know.” The boatman grinned, before his expression turned serious. “But onto something more serious. I think they’ve found me.”

Crisostomo froze, and he stared at Elias, wide-eyed. The man nodded grimly, the line of his tendon on his neck flexing distractingly beneath taut bronze skin.

“I was… around last night and I overheard two Civil Guards talking of a sighting of their missing interloper.” He frowned at a particular stick of wood on the boat and picked it up, unsheathing his pocket knife out from a scabbard that poked out from the waistband of his trousers, the hilt a stark black against his skin through the barong that melded well with the complexity of the inky black tattoo that sprawled down the side of his toned arm. “They’re planning something for the fiend tomorrow while he is at Mass.” He began to sharpen the stick into a sharp point, something Crisostomo had learned was a habit of his when he needed something to fidget with.

“Mass?” he asked, removing his gloves before reaching forward to hold the man’s hand holding the wood and blade to find them shaking.

“I think I may have wronged my disguise in church yesterday.” Elias replied, slipping the wood and metal from his hands to squeeze Crisostomo’s.

The aristocrat bit his lip. “You never let things like this get to you.”

“Rarely.”

“Why your hands, then?”

Elias looked right at Crisostomo, black eyes hard and strong as his hands boring into Crisostomo’s softer browns, and unconsciously he rubbed his thumb over callouses and scars.

“I made a mistake, Crisostomo.” Elias replied, slowly, as if steadying himself. “I _cannot_ afford to make mistakes.”

“We _all_ make mistakes, you’re only hu—”

“A man sworn to protect you.” Elias cut him off, looking away. “Those other times they nearly got me, those were when you had yet to need me, like _this_ ,” he looked down at their hands, joined together, “And I had wanted them to know. To throw them off scents of others.”

He lifted Crisostomo’s hands to his lips and brushed them over his knuckles.

“This was a mistake—unintentional, _dangerous_.”

Crisostomo pursed his lips before slipping one of his hands out of Elias’ and cupping the man’s cheek, wiping away a bead of sweat that rolled down his temple.

“If they trace me to you, you are _ruined_ —”

“No, Elias, hush.” Crisostomo softly spoke, pressing a finger against the man’s lips. “They will not.”

Elias peered at him, silent, questioning, before the aristocrat smiled intimately at him.

“I know you will find a way.”

“I always do.” Elias replied. “I just highly doubt you would approve of it.”

Crisostomo paused for a moment, and understood. Elias, mysterious and deadly and kind and loving—would so much as stain his own hands, his soul, for him.

He sighed. “You truly are troublesome.” At his words, Elias blinked at him, cocking his head, before he looked at him. “I know your methods.” He slowly said, lacing their fingers together and looking at the darkness of Elias’ skin against his, slightly paler and smoother, and imagined the blood of fallen, unknown enemies on both of their hands, sticky and drying and every ounce as sinful as this simple act of holding each other like this, in the secrecy of the river and of the wood and he sighed. “If you need it, then do as you will.”

Elias was taken aback. “Crisostomo, I,”

“If the Civil Guard will be missing a few officers tomorrow then I am sure the people will hardly miss them.” Crisostomo murmured and at this Elias sighed.

“Well then.”

The young man shook his head, chuckling. “What’s another enemy gone, right?”

Elias laughed, shaking his head. “I think I’ve become a bad influence on you.”

“Let’s hope I’m at least a good one on you.” Crisostomo replied, and with a shaking laugh that rocked the boat, Elias stood up and pulled straw his hat off and leant forward as the foliage around them thickened and a dark shadow fell over them as the hat hid nothing and everything from the trees and leaves and vines and mangroves as two lips met, smiles on both, rough and dry against soft and rich.

* * *

The last officer pointed his gun at the young man, shaking wildly in the dim light of the candle that was lit in the bell tower, where high above their head he knew that sad little boy—Basilio, was it?—was ringing the bell once again for the evening.

“You demon! _Demon_!” he squawked, taking a step back as the young man wiped the corner of his mouth with the back of his hand, flicking aside the blood that trickled out as he took a slow step forward. “Man-eater! Devil!”

“I made a mistake letting my identity slip this time around,” he stated slowly, mouth parting to show lips wet with blood and teeth stained with red. “Never again.”

He charged forward, blunt teeth sinking into a throat that never got a chance to let out a final cry.

“Let God be your judge in death.” He murmured, lost into the sound of tearing skin and ripping flesh and breaking bones.

When all was said and done, he dropped the bodies into the same river he piloted on and cleaned up the room he did his deed, still covered in blood and gore and flesh from that night’s fulfilling hunt. He would never need to hunt again for another few days—a small mercy for someone guarding another night and day.

Without another word he got on his boat again and piloted it near a mansion by the river where there were lights and music and the tittering of people talking and laughing and he knew he came to the right place.

He brought the boat to the shore and found a spot in the moonlight to wash himself. He slipped off his trousers, stained with blood, before dipping into the cool water to wash the blood out from the creases in his skin and mouth.

He made sure he was bathing in the silver glow of the moon. It was, by now, a beacon for that one person who _should_ be watching—

It took him a few minutes but soon enough there were running footsteps in the grass as he watched the last of the blood get swept away downstream, leaving him clean and standing in the clear, clear water, naked for the world to see everything—except his real self, that _demon_ that guard had called him.

“Elias, you’re…” a breathless Crisostomo stammered from the riverbank and he plastered a cocky smile on his lips.

“You’re watching.” He said coyly, and a flush, highlighted by the moonlight, crossed Crisostomo’s face.

“You were the one putting yourself on display like this.”

Elias chuckled behind his wrist as his hand pulled out a bit of flesh from behind his ear and he flicked it into the darkness where Crisostomo was unable to see.

“Only for you, my love.” He smiled, beckoning the aristocrat into the water. Crisostomo laughed, shaking his head fondly, before shucking out of his clothes and joining the man in the water as behind them the laughter and music and lights died down for the night, leaving them alone in the moonlight, black eyes meeting brown as lovers met in the silent secret of the forest.

“How did you do it?” Crisostomo asked, back smeared with mud later on, as they lay together at the banks of the river, the boat next to them swaying gently in the waves, the water lapping against them cool and familiar.

“Do what?” Elias nonchalantly asked.

“Protect yourself.”

The man looked down at Crisostomo and grinned. “I did what was needed.”

“And the bodies?”

“The nonchalance of you saying that makes me worry, Crisostomo.”

The aristocrat scowled and smeared mud on Elias’s side, right on top of the man’s tattoo, and he laughed.

“Alright, alright. They’re disposed of. You don’t need to worry.” He smiled, cleaning off the mud on his skin, smirking at little as he nearly felt the young man’s gaze following his hand and the trickle of water in the creases of his muscle as it ran down his arm.

“Ever the clean worker.” Crisostomo murmured almost inaudibly, and Elias grinned and kissed him soundly, the aristocrat’s eyes slipping shut as the pilot’s turned an unearthly red, before he too shut his eyes and deepened the kiss.

They parted, panting slightly, and the demon of a man smiled against his lover’s lips.

“Only for you, my Crisostomo.”

 


End file.
